Some account of the art of photogenic drawing

Manuscript paper 'Some account of Photogenic Drawing or, the process of which Natural Objects may be made to delineate themselves, without the aid of the Artist's Pencil', written by William Henry Fox Talbot and read at the Royal Society on 31 January 1839. Describes how in the spring 1834 he began to put into practice a method he had devised some time previously, for employing 'to purposes of utility the very curious property which has been long known to chemists to be possessed by the nitrate of silver: namely its discoloration when exposed to the violet rays of light. The process of the photogenic drawing would become one of the earliest forms to produce photographic images. This work would culminate in the publication of 'The pencil of nature' in 1844, the first commercial photography book launched to promote Talbot's invention.